


Past Due

by TheDandyCrickette



Series: The Whumpening (Whumptober 2019) [1]
Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout - Fandom, Fallout 3
Genre: Charon's contract, Extortion, Gen, Violence, Whumptober, Whumptober 2019
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-03
Updated: 2019-10-03
Packaged: 2020-11-22 21:38:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 868
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20881085
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheDandyCrickette/pseuds/TheDandyCrickette
Summary: Ahzrukhal gets word that an old debtor is back in town and sends Charon out to be the welcoming party.





	Past Due

**Author's Note:**

> Day 1: Shaky Hands

Patches snuck into The Ninth Circle through the side door – as much as Patches was able to sneak with his lurching, clumsy gait anyway – and sidled up to the counter to crooked a finger in Ahzrukhal’s direction. From his corner at the back of the bar, Charon braced himself for the worst. Ahzrukhal’s patience for Patches was thinner than the wispy remnants of hair on his scalp and unfortunately Charon was the one he sent to do his dirty work.

Sure enough, the owner of The Ninth Circle looked annoyed, disgusted even, as he moved to see what the drunkard Patches wanted. But when Patches leaned across the counter to mumble something to Ahzrukhal, the bar owner’s scarred, peeling lips spread into a wicked grin. He clapped a hand on Patches’ shoulder and handed him a beer saying, “Well done, Patchwork, my friend. I think you’ve earned yourself a treat. Now get out of my sight.”

Patches wasn’t halfway out the door before Ahzrukhal gestured Charon over with a sharp nod. “You remember Downy Joe, don’t you Charon?” Ahzrukhal asked.

“Of course.” Downy spent months at a time in Underworld talking people’s ears off and running up an impressive tab at The Nine Circle. He’d ended his last visit suddenly, while most of Underworld were asleep, and left an open tab of hundreds of caps. Ahzrukhal had spent days spitting mad.

“Seems he’s on his way back into town, should be at the museum steps any minute now. Catch him before he makes it into town and see if he’s got anything for me. If not, teach him a lesson. I expect to see him crawling.”

There was no use arguing, no use trying to resist the command. Charon flexed his fist to keep his hand from trembling. Disobedience wasn’t an option. Ever. Not so long as Ahzrukhal held his contract and the very thought of defying him sent a screeching down Charon’s spine.

“What if he does have your caps?” Charon asked.

“I still want you to rough him up. Make it clear I won’t tolerate that stunt of his again.”

Here’s hoping, Charon thought and left the bar without another word. He took up post in the museum lobby and leaned against one of the crumbling columns with a cigarette while he waited.

He didn’t have to wait long.

Downy crept into the museum with his head on a swivel and Charon flicked the cigarette away. He was within arms’ reach of the other ghoul before Downy spotted him, squeaked with terror, and went immediately pale. Charon lifted Downy effortlessly by the front of his ragged coveralls and slammed him against the lobby’s central desk, stirring up a cloud of centuries-old dust and knocking the breath from Downy’s chest at the same time.

“Ahzrukhal’s money,” Charon growled, “For your sake, I hope you have it.”

“Charon, please!” Downy gasped, scrabbling uselessly at the meaty fists holding him down.

“The caps, bub,” Charon insisted.

“I’m working on it!”

Charon slugged him across the face and felt rather than heard the wet crunch beneath Downy’s wail. His fist came away with blood.

“Let me go talk to Tulip,” Downy pleaded, his bloodshot eyes wild with panic. “I’ve got scrap, I think I can cut a good deal with her, pay back Ahzrukhal.”

“You think? Or do you know?” Charon pressed. Not that it mattered. Downy hesitated and Charon took the opportunity to pull him off the desk and drag him across the lobby to one of the museum’s side rooms where none of Underworld’s ghouls would stumble on the scene and be tempted to try to intervene.

Once he had the proper privacy, Charon laid into Downy like a madman carrying out Ahzrukhal’s orders. Downy simpered and begged until Charon was shaking with rage. Too often he found himself hating Ahzrukhal’s debtors almost as much as Ahzrukhal himself because they brought Ahzrukhal’s wrath down upon themselves and then blamed Charon for being the mechanism of their punishment. That’s what Charon felt when Downy was doubled over at his feet with enough of the shit kicked out of him to please a sadist like Ahzrukhal. By the time it was done, his hands were shaking and he wanted to kill something. Someone.

Instead he pulled Downy to his feet and dragged the poor bum all the way to the door of Tulip’s shop. It was the least he could do. Before dropping Downy to the ground again, he pulled the man close and hissed “Get your bill settled quick or I might have to put you down. Don’t make me do this again. Got it?” A pathetic nod from Downy and Charon left.

Charon headed back out to the lobby to collect himself with a smoke before returning to The Ninth Circle and Ahzrukhal’s smug face. Under the gloomy museum lights, for once he didn’t wonder what it would be like to put a bullet in his boss’s head. There was plenty of time to imagine that back at his post. Instead he clenched and unclenched his fists, flexing all the powerful muscles in his hands, and wondered what it would feel like for them to be his own.


End file.
